~ Book Reviews

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

I guess that I can resume my entire experience with this book in one sentence: I am not sure I liked it.

As usual, I liked the secondary characters best. I liked Earl and Rachel, while I thought Greg was alright. He made me laugh out loud several times, but also made me groan out loud at his attitude for most of the book. Nevertheless, Greg was a very interesting character with almost no emotional intelligence whatsoever… So when you force him to befriend a girl who is dying of cancer, there can only spell out trouble.

I think what bothered me most about this book is the lack of plot. This is one long rant about his movie making, his “friendship but not friendship, more like a work-type of relationship” with Earl, and how being with Rachel feels terribly painful all the time. Was this book inspiring? No. But then again, most would argue that cancer isn’t something to inspire, and it definitely isn’t. While this book had its laugh out loud moments, it left me feeling rather bleak by the time I flipped that last page.

I’m glad I read it, but I can’t say that I would ever pick it up again. Also, reading it sort of turned me away from wanting to go watch the movie, but maybe I will just to see what comes out of the adaptation.